


How about I go looking for my happiness?

by the_milky_way



Series: 25 Days of Buck and Eddie [17]
Category: 9-1-1 (TV)
Genre: 25 Days of Fic, Christmas Presents, Eddie wants more, Fluff, Friends With Benefits, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, Happy Ending, Light Angst, M/M, Prompt Fic, Soft Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV), Soft Evan "Buck" Buckley, Soft Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz, for real, prompts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-17
Updated: 2020-12-17
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:02:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28134378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_milky_way/pseuds/the_milky_way
Summary: Eddie has never been someone who wanted grand gestures or did them himself. Not with his high school date before Shannon and not with Shannon either. The one time he tried ended with her telling him wasn’t going to be a father again and with her demanding a divorce.Or:Eddie finds the perfect present for Buck. So he hopes Buck will get the meaning behind and maybe even feels the same way.
Relationships: Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz, Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV)
Series: 25 Days of Buck and Eddie [17]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2036098
Comments: 20
Kudos: 324





	How about I go looking for my happiness?

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt for Day 17
> 
> "Shiny"

Eddie has never been someone who wanted grand gestures or did them himself. Not with his high school date before Shannon and not with Shannon either. The one time he tried ended with her telling him wasn’t going to be a father again and with her demanding a divorce. So grand gestures or going all out romantically isn’t him. That’s why he is kind of surprised with himself for stopping in front of the window of a jewelry store. 

The necklace that caught his eye is a simple design, silver but shiny with a small clasp and no pendants. He instantly knows what he wants to add to it and who it should be for. That is probably the bigger surprise there. He doesn’t know why he thinks this is a good idea. He’s got all his Christmas presents ready and wrapped at home - so there is no reason to get another one. But just the thought of handing it over, of watching the reaction to it has Eddie stepping through the entrance and inside the store.

Once back home, he stores his purchase in the same drawer he keeps his dog tags in. He isn’t ready to take the next step of what he wants to do, so he’ll let it rest a few days. And if he should decide not to go through with it, no one needs to know. No one actually does know so that’s an advantage. He has taught Christopher not to snoop through his room or his drawers, which the boys keeps to like an order. It thankfully saves Eddie from some embarrassing talks he and probably Christopher, too, are not ready for yet.

He lets the box sit in his drawer until the day before Christmas Eve. Buck will be around for that so they can put all the presents under the tree and surprise Chris with a breakfast on Christmas morning. Buck and him, it sort of slipped into something that is more than friends but less than partners. With benefits sounds about right. It’s not exactly what Eddie expected but it works. At least for now. And maybe he’ll get a chance for more soon. If only he can be courageous enough and actually go through with his plan.

So the night before Christmas Eve he settles down on his bed, Chris long asleep and in the land of dreams. The dark box sits on the white sheet like a foreign object, an artefact, creating a stark contrast between the two. Eddie tangles his dog tags around his fingers, wonders for the nth time why he never even thought about giving them to Shannon. 

If he had, his plan wouldn’t be possible now and he wouldn’t be sitting here, contemplating if the result of it will be abysmally bad or miraculously awesome. And he should stop watching shows with Christopher, those slogans get stuck if you hear them too often. After a few turns of the chain between his fingers Eddie moves with determination. He unclips one of the tags from the original chain, puts it on the sheet next to the box and gets up to put the remaining tag back into his drawer. He feels like one of those pretentious teenagers from this show his sisters used to watch, something with a creek or so. So here he is feeling like he is getting a bff-necklace ready. 

One part for the bff and one part for him. He laughs at the ridiculousness of it. That’s another reason why he’s never been one for grand gestures, he would always fear breaking down laughing while going through with them. This time though Eddie is pretty sure that he’ll be tongue-tied when he hands it over. Back on his bed he grabs the box, opens it and is relieved to see that the chain remains simple but shiny. Nothing fancy but elegant enough to mean something. He fiddles a while with the clasps, feels a bit stupid when he can’t figure out how to open it at first only to manage it accidentally.

The tag slides along the thin silver chain until it hangs in the crook at the middle of it. It fits. He hasn’t polished the tags in years and they look it. Life has been present on them, as well as death has. There isn’t a patina but the surface doesn’t look shiny either. The perfect contrast between his current life and the one of the past. And if it is accepted the way he hopes, maybe it’ll be a way into the future. Eddie laughs again, mockingly this time. He feels a little pathetic for having these thoughts.

The silver chain with the tag wanders back into the box. This time he wraps it in christmas themed paper and puts it on top of his dresser. He won’t put it under the tree. This simply isn't a present for family time. It’s one he needs, wants to give when his son isn’t around. 

Eddie sleeps surprisingly well once he stops staring at the wrapped box on his dresser. He doesn’t dream about what his plan could turn into and he doesn’t wake up with a mass of doubts clouding his mind. Either he’s totally delusional or his mind actually thinks that this is a good idea, too. He’s hoping for the latter.

Being busy with Chris all day, having lunch at Abuela’s and then getting back home in time for Buck to arrive sort of lets the day fly by. Eddie doesn’t spare many thoughts towards the box on his dresser. Before he knows it Chris is in bed, the presents are under the tree and Buck’s sprawled across his couch with a cup of hot chocolate between his hands. He looks comfortable there, cozy even and Eddie likes it. He likes how Buck fits into his home, his life, his family. The second the clock on his cable receiver switches over to midnight and into Christmas Eddie is on his feet. Which startles Buck a little.

“You okay? Wanna go to bed already?” Buck slurs his words a little, enough that Eddie knows he’s exhausted from the half day shift he took on. He feels something like fondness swell in his chest at the thought that Buck still insisted on doing this for Chris.

“No. Not yet. Just need to get something. Stay here, I’ll be right back.” 

He isn’t nervous per se, just maybe a little jittery about the outcome of it all. He doesn’t want to mess it up, destroy their friendship with a stupid gesture but at the same time he wants more with Buck. He wants to try and see if the “with benefits” could be something more meaningful. When he grabs the box and turns back towards the door Eddie halts for a moment - looks down onto the present in his hand that could either make them or break them in ways he thinks he hasn’t really considered yet. But he doesn’t want to stop now. 

So he takes a step and another and another until he is standing beside the couch where Buck’s still sitting, waiting, eyes fixed on the tree in the corner but with a soft smile on his lips. 

“Buck?”

The smile gets wider when Buck sees Eddie standing there and a notch brighter when he zooms in on the present in Eddie’s hand.

“What’s this? Thought we are doing presents in the morning?”

Here goes nothing Eddie thinks with some sort of hysteria bubbling up inside of him. He swallows it down, pushes it back into the darkest corners of his being and sits down next to Buck again.

“We are. Just… this is something I wanted to give you without an audience.”

“Oh?” Buck’s eyebrows rise up high and then he waggles them, like he thinks he knows what Eddie is saying there. And he couldn’t be more wrong. Eddie laughs at that even though he now feels so nervous that he’s close to choking on air. 

“Open it. Just, can you promise me something?”

He must sound a little desperate there because Buck’s wide grin dims a little, a certain kind of seriousness visible in his features now. 

“Sure.”

“If it’s… well if it’s too much, let me know? Just tell me honestly what you think and not what you think I want or need to hear. Okay?”

“You are making me nervous here, Eddie. What is this, some kind of raw diamant or something? Yeah, I promise.”

Eddie hands the box over then, draws his hands into his lap and watches on. Buck doesn’t tear into the paper but slowly peels it off. First the edges then the rest of it. Eddie wants to scream at him to fucking get done with it, he wants this to be over either way. But he also wants to savor every single second of anticipation. His own and Buck’s. 

Buck’s knee is bouncing slightly, up and down, which makes the box rattle when he sets it onto his thigh to get rid of the paper. He frowns a little when the chain inside clunks around a bit, raises his head to look at Eddie. And Eddie can’t say anything. Words are stuck in his throat, sweat is pooling in the small of his back and he’s twisting his hands in the fabric of his pants so much that they cramp.

The silence that reigns when Buck finally opens the box is soo loud it might as well be thunder. Eddie doesn’t dare to look away, doesn’t dare to breathe and wonders if this is even a big thing. Why has he made the entire thing into something this huge in his mind? Maybe Buck will just like it, say thank you and move on. But no, Buck’s not stupid. Not at all. He’ll know the meaning behind it, the significance of it. So Eddie watches.

“Eddie.”

It’s almost whispered into the air surrounding them. Reverent in a way Eddie has barely ever heard from Buck before. Awestruck maybe. There goes the rock off his chest. One of the many.

“This is… I feel… wow. Do you… do you mean this?” 

Buck is looking at him, eyes wide and maybe just as shiny as the silver chain he is holding between his fingers now. Dog tag swinging, drawing attention. Oh does he mean. 

“Yeah. Yes. If you want it, that is.”

“Fuck, Eddie. Of course. I thought you were okay with things as they are, so I didn’t dare to ask for more. I hoped, though.”

“Same here. I think… we, this can work. I want us to work, to try. That okay?”

Instead of answering with words Buck practically flies across the couch, covers Eddie with his entire body and drags him into a kiss that is answer enough. They’ve always been good at that, showing what they want through actions. They make-out like horny teens, caught up in the heady feelings of getting together. Hot and heavy, slow and exploring - like they hadn’t kissed before and still knowing how to draw the other in. They stop when Buck’s hands are trapped underneath Eddie’s shirt and he can’t prevent himself from sliding halfway off the couch. It’s low laughter and shiny eyes for a while, reassuring hugs and soft kisses for a moment longer after that. 

They are getting ready for bed when Buck turns towards Eddie and holds the necklace out.

“Put it on for me?”

So Eddie does. He gets the clasps open without problems this time, moves the thin piece of silver around Buck and closes the clasps against the back of Buck’s neck. Then Eddie simply wrapps his arms around Buck from behind, hooks his chin over a stronger shoulder and admires his dog tag lying on warm skin. It’s a sight he rather likes. A piece of him - albeit arbitrary and sort of entrenched in a lot of memories, but still somehow him. 

“Merry Christmas, Buck,” he finally says, lets his lips press against the jaw he finds and simply holds on to the man in his arms.

“Merry Christmas, Eds. You do know that I’ll be wearing this proudly and very open once we get back to work, right?”

The laugh that escapes him settles some more of the worries still lingering around. Buck is there. Buck is wearing it. Buck wants more, too. And they’ll have all the time to figure out what more consists of. For now Eddie just wants to fall into bed and have Buck in his arms knowing he’ll be there in the morning.

“Wouldn’t expect anything less from my boyfriend.”

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, don't ask me. I have no idea why I thought Eddie would do something like this.
> 
> Thank you, A. and happiest of birthdays to you.  
> <3


End file.
